During schooling, students are presented with vast quantities of information. Some of this information is easily remembered by some students, and less easily remembered by other students. Moreover, some of the information is more important, and this distinction may be made by a student when trying to commit the information to memory. Once information is remembered, students are then faced with the difficulty of retaining the information in memory long enough for it to be retrieved for the purpose of completing an assessment, or more preferably, for use later in life. This difficulty can be substantially overcome by shifting the information from short-term memory to long-term memory.
There are many established learning techniques which are said to improve one's ability to remember certain facts or items of information over both short and long periods of time. Rehearsal or repetition of facts and activities is useful in reinforcing one's memory of certain items of information and may be practiced during revision of coursework done by students in preparation for exams. However, it is difficult to manage a learning program which is directed towards committing vast quantities of information to memory.
Learning devices and systems exist which use rehearsal or repetition to test one's memory. However, they are deficient because they often fail to cater to an individual's ability to learn information. Further, they fail to address the fact that the better “memorized” an item of information is, the less frequently it must be revised in order to be retained in one's memory.
In addition, given the vast amount of information currently available it is unrealistic to think that one could learn all of it. Different pieces of information have different importance, and current testing methods fail to assert learning of important information over relatively unimportant information. Accordingly, a need exists for a method of systematically testing memory which addresses these deficiencies in current learning practices.
The discussion of the background to the invention included herein including reference to documents, acts, materials, devices, articles and the like is intended to explain the context of the present invention. This is not to be taken as an admission or a suggestion that any of the material referred to was published, known or part of the common general knowledge in the patent area as at the priority date of any of the claims.